Due to the continuous extension of today's global market and competition domains, the protection of your business name has become more important than ever before. Advances in communication media and internet has widely spread information amongst the public all around the world. This has made it easier for a competitor to make use of your valuable reputation.

 

Thus, if you intend to have a brand and proceed with advertising, it is much safer to protect this brand and make it a registered trademark. Otherwise, third party's imitation of your trademark would be quite possible making use of the effort and money you have exerted in building up your reputation. Imitation might also take place innocently.

 

Whether innocent or willful, infringement of your trademark is hard to overcome if it is not duly registered. Defending non-registered trademarks usually entails long procedure of Court cases, which in most cases take a long time to be settled and significant amount of money, taking into account that a favorable Court decision is not guaranteed in all cases. This means that your registered trademark may well be your most valuable asset.

 

The following are the major benefits of registering a trademark:

 

1- Protects the business and owner from significant financial loss as a result of possible infringement.

 

2- Gives the registrant exclusive legal ownership over the mark, and exclusive right to use the mark nationwide.

 

3- It refrains others from claiming that your trademark is an infringement upon theirs.

 

4- It is an official proof of precedence of the trademark, which means that any party that intends to have a confusingly similar mark can not claim ignorance of existence of previously registered mark.

 

5- The registered trademark will appear on any search report requested by third party, who intends to use and register a similar trademark. Therefore, such appearance may urge this party not to apply for this similar trademark registration.

 

6- It grants the owner the right to recover damages and attorney's fees from a possible infringer.

 

7- In the countries that examine trademark applications, the Trademark Office will refuse any application for the registration of a trademark that is confusingly similar to yours.

 

8- A registered trademark is a prerequisite for franchising a business.

 

9- A registered trademark can be marked with the sign ® alerting others from using or claiming rights in your trademark.